


Haunt Me

by shadowfaerieammy



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst, Marichat, but also kind of not?, ghost au, ghost!Chat au, really sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-04
Updated: 2017-03-04
Packaged: 2018-09-28 07:47:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10080041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowfaerieammy/pseuds/shadowfaerieammy
Summary: When they were younger, still children freshly gifted with magic and a responsibility too heavy for their narrow shoulders to bare, Chat died in battle. Marinette blames herself.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is actually something I wrote based on a sketch I did. The tumblr link is below.  
> http://this-is-a-chat-astrophe.tumblr.com/post/157985502358/a-really-sketchy-doodle-of-a-really-sad-au-when

When they were younger, still children freshly gifted with magic and a responsibility too heavy for their narrow shoulders to bare, Chat died in battle. Marinette blames herself.

The akuma was particularly destructive, blowing things up left and right. Marinette was too busy looking for a place to transform to realize she was in the shadow of a falling building. Chat pushed her out of the way and took her place beneath the rubble. The damage was too extensive for his suit or her magic to diminish. When the magic faded and he didn’t move, she dragged him to an alley before her transformation ran out. The last thing he heard was Marinette's sobbed apologies and regrets of not being a better partner.  
His transformation didn’t fade, even after Marinette, as instructed by Tikki, removed his ring. After Tikki ate a cookie, Marinette became Ladybug once again and carried her partner to Master Fu’s because of course he could help.

He couldn’t help. The damage was done. The only assistance he could offer would be in revealing Chat’s identity to her so she could inform his family. She told him she didn’t want to know, and while she left him with that burden he left her with Chat’s ring. “It will take time to find someone and Plagg will need this time to heal. Wear it until the time comes.”

Hawkmoth gave up shortly after Chat Noir’s death for reasons unknown and the miraculouses were no longer needed but Marinette clung tightly to the connection between herself and the boy who died so she could live. Master Fu did not ask for the miraculouses back and only asked that she return them whenever she was ready, be it in weeks or in decades.  
She hardly slept in the following weeks, cursed with nightmares of that day rerunning over and over. She still heard his voice, and sometimes she saw him. Eventually she got used to the hallucinations that only came when her kwamis were tucked away. It wasn’t till he appeared one particular night that she realized he was a ghost. Plagg hadn’t quite fallen asleep on the pillow among Marinette’s hair when the apparition appeared. He screamed, startling both Marinette and Tikki awake. The clever, comforting catboy that’d appeared to her almost nightly since his death was not a hallucination but a real ghost.

Marinette was undeniably thankful that her time with Chat wasn’t truly over. Their time had been cut short by a cruel twist of fate and now she could believe him when he said he had no regrets about how he died.

But as time goes on, her feelings get muddled. She’s happy that her best friend shall always be by her side. But she loves him, is in love with him, and his presence will leave a constant ache in her heart that nobody else could ever fill. And as the years pass, she ages while he is frozen as time as a cruel reminder of the day they failed. Chat is still the epitome of boyish charm but Marinette is an adult now and he gets to see her grow up but she regrets not being able to see the man he could have, should have, become.


End file.
